"C'mon, Alys," the trainee (er, make
that, as of today, full-fledged) Hunter Chaz Ashley called over
his shoulder to his partner and mentor, Alys Brangwin. "Let's take a
look at all these books."

Chaz and Alys were in the Motavia
Academy, located in Piata, the Town of Learning. The awesome feelings
Chaz felt at finally being a full-scale Hunter were overshadowed only by
his feelings of wonder as he gazed around him at the Academy itself: the
books, the rooms, the desks, the telescope he'd seen down the hall, and
even the students themselves.

He had been raised on the streets, and so
as much as he wanted to, there was no way he'd ever had the Meseta
necessary to attend the Academy. But now, today, he was beginning a new
life -- the life of a Hunter. The extremely high-paying life of a
Hunter, that is. Maybe I can do this Hunter stuff for a few years,
save up some Meseta, Chaz thought, and then come here and attend
the Academy. I think I'm smart enough to make it.

"There's so many of them in this place!"
Chaz exclaimed as he stepped into a small study room. The room itself
housed a few tables and three book racks, each crammed with thick
volumes. "Have you ever seen this many books in one place before?" he
asked. When he received no answer, he turned around to see Alys leaning
against the room's doorway, arms folded across her chest, her eyes boring
into him with a look of total disapproval.

"We have work to do here, Chaz," she
grumbled softly. "We don't have time to sit around and gawk and dusty,
moldy old... books." She spoke the last part of her sentence as if the
word itself was as dusty and moldy as the works on the shelves. All
she cares about is her weapons, Chaz shook his head before promptly
stepping further into the room, ignoring Alys's words and the exasperated
sigh his new action prompted.

"Hello, sir," Chaz smiled to a
hunched-over, white-haired old man who peered at the text of a book
through his bifocal lenses. "What are you reading?"

"What kind of history?" Chaz asked,
excited at the prospect of learning. "Stuff about what Motavia was like
when I was born?"

"Oh no, much farther back than that," the
professor smiled, removing his bifocals. "You look to be no more than
15--"

"I'm 16!" Chaz replied harshly.

"Nevertheless," the professor continued,
"I'm reading about events which took place on Motavia between the years AW
1286 and 1288, though in some places they call this period, err..." He
replaced his glasses and checked his text, then again lowered his lenses
from his eyes. "Space Century 352.00 through 352.02."

"AW 1286?" Chaz repeated. "That's almost
1,000 years ago!"

"Indeed," the professor nodded.
"Nine-hundred ninety-eight, to be precise."

"Chaz..." Alys called from the doorway.
Her tone was not getting any more pleasant.

Chaz dismissed her with a wave, then
returned to his conversation with the professor. "So what was life like
1,000 years ago?" the young Hunter asked. "Was it pretty much like life
today?"

"Oh no, not at all!" the professor
exclaimed, slamming his book shut and replacing it on the shelf. As he
dived into his speech about Motavia's history, the professor's tone
quickly grew more and more jovial. The subject
matter obviously excited him. "Civilization was highly advanced back
then! We know very little about the time, but we do know that
there were many electronic devices called computers, and they were all
linked together somehow by a giant computer
that controlled every aspect of our lives. Through Mother Brain, as it
was called, miraculous things were made very possible. Tell me something,
mister...?"

"Ashley. Chaz Ashley."

"Mister Ashley, how would you like to be
able to travel half-way across Motavia--" He snapped his fingers. "--in
the blink of an eye?"

"That's impossible!"

"Not with Mother Brain, it wasn't. With
Mother Brain, we could even travel amongst the stars, and visit the
distant Dezolis, as well as the sparkling jewel Parma!"

"P...Parma?" Chaz repeated, trying out the
unfamilar word.

"Chaz Ashley?" Alys called from gritted
teeth. "Or should I say, former Hunter Chaz Ashley?"

"In a minute," Chaz called to her.

"Parma was another planet here in the Algo
system," the professor explained. "It floated in space between Motavia
and Dezolis."

"Wow," was all Chaz could manage to
whisper. Then, the big question came to mind. If all this magic really
existed... "What happened?"

The professor shook his head. "We don't
know very much. All we do know is that a thousand years ago,
our society was thrown into confusion by the destruction of Mother Brain.
After that, Motavia sustained a direct hit by a fragment of the
exploding planet Parma."

"It exploded?" Chaz asked,
stunned.

"Yes, but we don't know why!" the
professor answered. "And from all that we can tell, the fragment which
collided with Motavia did not strike until about two years after
the planet's explosion! When that happened, our civilization was
almost destroyed. We lost
everything. This entire chain of events -- the explosion of Parma,
the destruction of Mother Brain, and finally, Motavia's collision with the
fragment of Parma... We call this 'The Great Collapse.'"

Again, Chaz found that all he could say
was, "Wow..." Then, after a pause. "Wait a minute. Why did it take two
years for the fragment to strike Motavia?"

"You mean what ultimately brought about
the Great Collapse?" the professor asked.

"Yeah," Chaz nodded. He wasn't finished,
either. "And if Parma was between Motavia and Dezolis, well then... when
the planet exploded, why wasn't Dezolis hit, too?"

"Mister Ashley, historians such as myself
have been asking each other those questions and many others for a long
time. We don't have any answers, but we will, however, be discussing
theories in class near the middle of the semester."

"Oh, well," Chaz shrugged, "I don't go to
the Academy."

"Oh," the professor replied, as if
suddenly embarrassed that he had gone on at such lengths. "I'm sorry.
I didn't realize you weren't students."

Plural? "Students?" Chaz repeated.
It was then that he felt the tap on his shoulder.

He turned around to see Alys standing
right behind him. Again folding her arms across her chest, one look at
her face told Chaz that she was not in a very happy mood. "Uhh,
Alys..."

"Don't 'Uhh Alys' me," the elder Hunter
mocked, grabbing Chaz by the neck of his shirt. "First you get lost, then
you start having conversations with old geezers who don't have anything
better to do than sit around and think all day. Meanwhile, we have work
to do. We have to go see the principal. Besides, you spend too much time
in here with these books, your brain's liable to turn into mush."

As they reached the doorway, Chaz turned
to wave good-bye to the history professor, but before he could, Alys, who
still gripped his shirt, tossed him playfully out into the hall. He
almost tripped but quickly he regained
his footing and fell into step beside her. "Alys," he asked seriously,
"do you ever wonder what could have brought about the Great Collapse?"

Alys shot him a harsh look. "Oh yeah, all
the time," she replied sarcastically. "Tell me, genius, how is thinking
about that going to help you to take down a sandworm, huh?"

"I was just wondering, that's all," Chaz
shrugged. "We used to be able to fly amongst the stars."

"Well I suggest you get your head
out of the stars and back down to Motavia. We have an assignment
to take care of."

With that, the issue was dropped and the
two of them proceeded to the principal's office, and Chaz's question
remained unanswered. It was not an easy question, at that; as the
professor had said, a definitive answer eluded all historians. In fact,
there was probably only one person -- no, one being -- in all of
Algo who could have effectively answered it.

Chaz Ashley would be meeting him soon
enough, but if Le Roof had been there at Motavia Academy rather than on
the distant planet Rykros at that moment, he might have said, "What
ultimately brought about the Great Collapse? It is a long story, but it
began when a very old man--

- - - - - - - - - -

Space Century 352.01

--stared out the window of his castle at
the asteroid field that surrounded his home, and farther than that, into
outer space, in which the castle floated. Far in the distance, he saw an
explosion he still considered large, despite the fact that it had
occurred across the solar system. The man
did not care that the explosion was actually the final, complete
destruction of the starship Noah, which, until recently, had been
used by the "religious" aliens who had visi
ted Algo, and even more recently, by some Dezorian (as green as the
others) to serve as the headquarters ship for something he called a New
Order. And the man who stood in the castle, completely devoid of all life
save for himself, did not so much as flinch, despite the explosion's size.

For he was Lassic, King of Algo, and he
was afraid of nothing.

He watched as the massive explosion
quickly died out, the oxygen needed to fuel its fire disappearing into the
vacuum of space. A pity, Lassic thought to himself. I almost
wish it would have lasted longer. It would at least serve as a
distraction from this tedium. With a sigh, he
instead turned from the window and started to walk across his large,
elegant throne room towards the throne itself, which sat across the room
on a high platform with a few short marble steps leading up to it. After
but a few seconds, however, Lassic
stopped, staring at the two torches which burned on either side of the
throne. He didn't quite know what it was... but something...

With a shrug, he started to walk again,
but after two more steps, he again paused. What is that noise? he
questioned himself. It was something that sounded distant, hollow, and it
stopped every time he stopped walking. It was nothing like the
usual noise that haunted him--

(Pplunnnk!)

--but this noise disturbed him,
nonetheless. For the third time, Lassic started towards his throne, and
this time, he pinpointed the noise immediately.

It was the sound of his own footsteps on
the floor of the throne room. The emptiness of the castle reverberated
the sound over and over.

It was yet another reminder to Lassic that
he was alone, that he had been alone for what seemed to him like a decade
now. The empty castle, completely devoid of all life save himself (Not
even Lusar is here to keep me company!), which was now, for some
reason, floating in the middle of an
asteroid field... it got to him. And the pain--

True, Lassic was not a man who was easily
frightened. However, he was very easily annoyed. He was also a
man filled with intense rage, and right now, he knew exactly who to direct
that rage towards.

"This is your doing, isn't it?" he
screamed aloud, hating the way his voice echoed and reechoed off the walls
of the castle. The question reverberated until it was no more, and Lassic
still had not received an answer. So, he screamed a demand. "Answer
me!"

"It's what you wanted, Lassic, isn't it?"
came a deep, raspy, grumbling voice from behind him. He turned around and
there, floating near the window, was an apparition of some sort. It had a
bony blue body (which was quite muscular in places), two yellow dots for
eyes which glowed in the middle
of deep black chasms, and, most notably, two enormous blue arms which
seemed to reach out for him. "Wasn't that our deal?"

"I can not enter your dimension," "Dark
Force" explained. "But since you live through my power, I can
enter your mind, and I appear to you in this form because this is the
easiest way for your mind to comprehend me."

The ghost of the demon actually smiled at
that. "You wouldn't understand, would you?" it grunted. "Dark
Force is, was, and always shall be but a physical manifestation of a part
of me, of my personality -- the only aspect of myself I am able to send
into your dimension. I, King Lassic, am the Profound Darkness."

"And you say," Lassic continued after a
beat, "that you are the one responsible for my return here to this empty
castle... what... five years ago? Ten?"

"It has been only one," the Profound
Darkness explained. "One year ago, the aliens who introduced me to you
betrayed Dark Force -- betrayed me -- as I always thought they
might. No matter. Soon afterwards, they were eliminated, though not
nearly as slowly as I'd hoped they would
be."

"It has been only one year since
those four barged into my throne room with talk of the Triumvirate Pact?"
Lassic whispered, trying to comprehend.

"No, you misunderstand," the Profound
Darkness said impatiently. "It has been one year since you were brought
back to life, one year since the dimensional seal was at its weakest. It
has been one thousand one years since the incident you speak of."

Lassic doubled over as if he'd been hit in
the stomach. It took a moment, but finally, he regained enough composure
to start shaking his head and pacing his throne room. "That can't be..."
he said softly. "I remember itall. One minute I was fighting them --
and I was winning -- and the next... there was--"

(Pplunnnk!)

"--a sound. A sound and... and pain, in
my back. The next thing I knew, the castle was empty, it was floating in
space, and I could not see Palma anywhere." He stopped pacing, spun on
his heels, and again faced the Profound Darkness. "I have been alone
ever since."

"You have been enjoying your reward for
serving me well during the time of the last Opening, a millennium ago,"
the Profound Darkness nodded. "So tell me, how do you enjoy
immortality?"

"This?" Lassic pointed at himself. "This
is immortality?"

The Profound Darkness narrowed its eyes
but did not say a word, so Lassic continued. "Oh no," he chuckled. "This
is not immortality. This is torture!" Slowly, he began stepping
towards the apparition, raising his hand to point an accusing finger at
the demon. "You, Dark Force, or whoever the hell you are -- you
screwed this up. I was supposed to receive immortal life,
not unlimited pain."

"You have experienced some discomfort?"
the Profound Darkness mocked.

The king stopped walking and stared at the
Profound Darkness in disbelief. "Discomfort?" Lassic repeated. He paused
for a moment...

And then he exploded.

"I can still feel the damn axe in my
back! Every time I blink my eyes, I hear that noise--"

(Pplunnnk!)

"--and feel the blade cutting through my
flesh from behind. I see that twit in front of me wailing about her dead
brother! I see that damn cat leaping at my face, and that damn Esper
waving his wand! I am all alone in this castle, and yet when I walk out
the front door in search of company, I
instantly find myself right here in my throne room. I can't leave! Oh
yes," he growled, "I fulfilled my part of the bargain, but don't even try
to suggest you've fulfilledyours, not until you take away this pain!"

"Pain?" the Profound Darkness muttered
softly. Then, it clenched its fist, and when it did, Lassic learned a new
meaning of the word.

He threw his head back and screamed at the
ceiling high above, bellowing as a fist reached right inside his heart and
squeezed it with all its massive strength. The king's arms and legs went
numb instantly, and he fell to his knees, still screaming. His entire
body shook with agony, and then,
the force that felt like a fist around his heart started to turn, and he
felt all his insides being twisted and pulled and oh god the
agony!

After what seemed like an eternity, the
pain disappeared, and Lassic collapsed. His face fell flat onto the
throne room floor. He was breathing heavily, but he didn't want to,
because his chest still hurt like hell and it was nothing but torment
every time he inhaled or exhaled. And once the
world returned to normal enough for him to realize what was going on
around him, he looked up and saw the apparition was staring directly at
him with pure evil in its glowing yellow
eyes.

"I trust we are now clear as to who is in
charge here, aren't we, Lassic?"

"Perfectly," he managed to spit out.
After that, still gasping, he somehow managed to get to his feet.

"Good. Now, you were saying something
about the price of immortality being too high for you, weren't you? You
were saying you wanted to be free of this pain?"

"Yes."

Apparently, the apparition found that
funny, as it started to laugh. "Lassic?" the Profound Darkness mocked.
"Lassic, the man who fears nothing -- except death, of course -- actually
rejecting immortality?"

This drew another chuckle from the
Profound Darkness. "They are one and the same."

"There must be a way," Lassic
insisted.

At that, the Profound Darkness nodded.
"All right, Lassic. Very well. I suppose we can make another deal. I
will grant you immortality without the pain."

"What do I have to do?" Lassic asked with
a sigh. He knew it would not come without a price.

"It's very simple, Lassic. You see,
you're my 'Plan B,' if you will. As I said, I suspected the men from
Earth might betray me, and so during the last Opening, when I sent a Dark
Force into your dimension, I resurrected you, as well. You, Lassic, are
my ticket out of my interdimensional prison."

"You speak of other dimensions," Lassic
said. "You are trapped in one."

"Ah, the specimen shows some intelligence
after all," the Profound Darkness smiled.

"How do I get you out?" Lassic went on,
doing his best to ignore the insult (because he knew he could not ignore
the pain if he didn't.)

"You don't get me anything," the
Profound Darkness clarified. "What you do is destroy things for
me. Three things, actually. First, there is a sword hidden
somewhere deep within the place called Esper Mansion on Dezoris. You
have seen the blade before. Alis Landale brought it with her the day she
came into your throne room with Myau, Odin, and Noah."

"What of it?" Lassic grumbled, not wishing
to relive the memory again.

"It is called Elsydeon. After Landale
used it in her battle with you, she used it to slay one of my Dark Forces.
During that battle, it took on magical properties. Somehow, it became
capable of killing me. It is the only weapon which can kill me.
It also now houses the souls of those
they call 'Protectors.' That is, those who have been thorns in my side for
far too long."

"You want me to destroy a sword which
houses the soul of Alis Landale?" Lassic laughed. "That shall not be a
mission, that shall be a pleasure."

"I'm glad you think so. Next, I want you
to destroy another object that has been in your presence before. When
Landale and her friends entered your throne room, they carried a small
crystal known as the aero-prism. I want it destroyed. With it gone,
much of the Protectors' magic will vanish,
as well."

"What makes it so special?" Lassic
asked.

"It is a piece of Rykros," the Profound
Darkness replied, "the fourth planet of the Algo solar system."

"Fourth planet?"

The Profound Darkness nodded. "It was
created by my mortal enemy, the Great Light, as a warning sign to the
Protectors that the seal on my prison was growing weak. He gave a piece
of the planet to each group of Desans, his hand-picked 'defenders of
righteousness' to show them the way to Rykros,
where they would battle with my Dark Forces.

"Two thousand years ago, however," the
Profound Darkness began to grin, "we wiped out the Desans. The Motavian
and Dezorian prisms were destroyed, but the Palman one remains. Take it
into your fist and crush it."

Lassic nodded. "It will be done. And the
final thing you want me to destroy?"

With a wide grin, the Profound Darkness
answered, "Motavia itself."

Stunned, the king could not reply for a
moment. Then, "The entire planet?"

"The Algo system itself is the seal on my
prison," the Profound Darkness explained. "One year ago, the men you knew
as alien priests destroyed Palma. Though they had already betrayed me,
they had no idea how great a service they did me by turning the planet
into the asteroid field your castle now resides in. During the next
Opening, with Palma gone, I shall be able to send myself through
and into your dimension, not just Dark Forces.

"But..." it continued, "if you destroy
Motavia as well, I will not have to wait 1,000 years for the next Opening,
I shall be able to free myself within a century. And if you can go on to
destroy Dezoris..." The apparition smiled and laughed. "Then, my dear
Lassic, the seal will be broken
completely, and I will enter your dimension immediately and personally
crush Rykros in the palm of my hand."

Lassic rubbed his chin as the Profound
Darkness continued to laugh its evil laugh. When it finally stopped, he
asked his question. "How am I to do all this by myself, especially
considering I can not leave this castle?"

"A problem I have already solved. Step
closer." The apparition beckoned him to approach. As he did so, its
long, blue arms seemed to grow longer as it reached out towards him, as if
it were going to meet him halfway.

Then, when Lassic was still several feet
from the apparition, its hands were suddenly on the side of his head.
Though it had no mass to its body, the demon's ghost-like hands managed to
knock Lassic's helmet from his head and place its palms on either side of
the dark king's face.

More pain then erupted through Lassic as
the demon's claws -- despite being intangible -- managed to puncture his
skull and dig directly into his brain.

The king roared in agony, though through
his screams he sensed massive amounts of energy -- pure black energy --
pouring from the form of the Profound Darkness, into his skull, and then
out into the throne room. The energy
did not come in one steady stream but rather in a series of pulses, about
one per second, and before long, Lassic found he could somehow sense that
he was no longer alone in the throne room.

The energy transference went on for
perhaps five minutes (to Lassic it seemed much longer) and when it
was over, the Profound Darkness simply removed its hands from Lassic's
head. The king instantly fell backwards to the floor, flat onto his
back. In the process, he cracked his already
agonized head hard on the marble floor. It took several minutes for
Lassic to regain consciousness enough to open his eyes. After another
handful of minutes, when Lassic finally climbed to his feet, he reached
for his helmet and scepter... and that's when he saw the new arrivals.

Monsters -- hundreds of monsters, just
standing at attention in his throne room, ready to act upon his every
command. There were winged beasts which floated near the throne room's
ceiling, and small scaly creatures which slid across the floor. There
were insectoid creatures which snapped their
pincers in anticipation of combat, and there were armored half-man
half-horse beasts which stood at attention with glowing spears ready.

And at the front of the crowd stood three
humanoid (or perhaps humanesque would be a better term) monsters
with long bony arms, their bodies wrapped in flowing red robes. "Meet
your army, Lassic," the Profound Darkness said from behind him. "And
meet your lieutenants, as well. They are
called Xe-A-Thouls. Give your orders to them, and they will see to it
that your army carries them out."

"I am Xarxas," the second spoke up. Its
voice differed very little from Xanon's.

"And I am Xerik," the third answered. "We
will command your army well, lord Lassic, and we will not fail
you."

"Failure is a word unknown to
Xe-A-Thouls," Xanon nodded.

"That's good to hear," Lassic nodded,
pacing before the three monsters, all of whom stood in a line next to one
another. "But there is one small problem." Without warning, Lassic swung
his scepter around in an arc, connecting it squarely with Xerik's
abdomen. The wizard grunted and bent over
in pain, and when it did, Lassic grabbed it by the collar and hissed into
its face. "I and no one else commands my army."

"I only meant--" Xerik started.

"You are not above my army,
Xe-A-Thoul, you are a part of it. Do not so much as imply
otherwise, is that understood?"

"Yes, my lord," Xerik agreed. With that,
Lassic released him from his grasp.

When he heard a chuckling behind him,
Lassic turned to see the Profound Darkness had folded its arms across its
chest and was smiling at him. "Very good, Lassic. But make no mistake,
the Xe-A-Thouls shall be your most valuable asset. You see, Alis Landale
may be gone... but her legacy
continues. In order to accomplish your goals you will no doubt have to
encounter a man named Rolf."

"Who is he?" Lassic asked.

"He is an Agent of the Palman government
on Motavia and part Esper. He is also the current 'Protector.'"

"He's an insignificant roach as far as I'm
concerned," Lassic said flatly. "He will not be a problem."

"And to see that he isn't," the Profound
Darkness smiled, "I have given the Xe-A-Thouls the knowledge of a secret
weapon which will bring Rolf to his knees."

Lassic turned his head around to look upon
the Xe-A-Thouls. He nodded at them, then returned his gaze to the image
of the Profound Darkness, which ever-so-slowly was beginning to vanish.
"You understand your mission?" it asked.

"Destroy Elsydeon, destroy the aero-prism,
and destroy Motavia," Lassic nodded. "And in return, I expect to be freed
of the pain."

"Oh, you will be freed, Lassic," the
Profound Darkness laughed. "I promise you, if you do not fail me, you
will be freed of all the pain, permanently. Now rest. Prepare your
army. Prepare the secret weapon. And then, as soon as it is ready...
attack and destroy."

With that, the image was gone, and with
this "Profound Darkness" gone, he, the great King Lassic, was once again
in charge. He folded his arms across his chest, still holding his
scepter, and gazed across the monstrous horde with whom he now shared his
castle. With a nod of approval, he turned his gaze out his window and at
the distant planet Motavia. Sirus's world. With Palma gone, the only
Palmans that were left resided there. A pity for them, for it was they
who would pay the price.

The four had plotted against him,
had barged into his throne room wailing about dead brothers and the
Triumvirate Pact. The had dared to attack him, and then, one of
them planted an axe in his back.

Amazingly enough considering what he was
thinking about, King Lassic started to laugh, because now, it was payback
time. So what if the twit Landale and her twit friends were dead? They
had fought for their people, hadn't they?

Well now it was time for the people
to pay the price, because King Lassic was back and soon, he would
again be their king in more than just name.